\nI’m an old guy and I’ve been programming for a long time. Virtually all of that programming has involved using a compiler or an assembler. Until I dabbled in AWK, Perl, and Python and started using Giuile, my only use of an interpreted language was some early recreational use of BASIC.\n<\/p>\n
\nFrom my very first programming language\u2014FORTRAN (gasp) as an undergraduate Math student\u2014I have been fascinated with compilers and the compiling process. In my career, I’ve implemented a bunch of little languages and even worked on a large scale compiler.\n<\/p>\n
\nIt would, therefore, never occur to me that any programmer would not understand what a compiler is or does. Not how they work\u2014that’s a bit of a dark art\u2014but just what they are and what they do. Apparently, in this as in so many things, I’m wrong.\n<\/p>\n
\nNader Naguib says that he’s seen a lot of beginners who don’t know about compilers so he published a short video<\/a> on what they are and what they do. It’s doubtful that any Irreal reader is confused on the matter but if you have a junior colleague who is, this is a good two minute introduction. The video is biased towards the C\/C++ languages but really applies to any language even if it doesn’t need a preprocessor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m an old guy and I’ve been programming for a long time. Virtually all of that programming has involved using a compiler or an assembler. Until I dabbled in AWK, Perl, and Python and started using Giuile, my only use … Continue reading